We have done with Hope and Honour. we are lost to Love and Truth, We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung; And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth. God help us, for we knew the worst too young!
Four things greater than all things are Women and horses and power and War.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests that women, horses, power, and war are of paramount importance in life.
Rudyard Kipling's quote reflects on the profound influence and significance of four entities—women, horses, power, and war—in the human experience. By framing these elements as greater than all else, he highlights their pivotal roles in shaping society, culture, and individual lives. The mention of women emphasizes their importance, while horses signify loyalty and strength, power represents authority and control, and war embodies conflict and struggle. Together, they encapsulate key aspects of existence and the complexities of human relations.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
During a speech about the role of women in society, one could use this quote to emphasize their significance.
More from Rudyard Kipling
All quotes →Humble because of knowledge; mighty by sacrifice.
Hear and attend and listen; for this is what befell and be-happened and became and was, O my Best Beloved, when the Tame animals were wild. The dog was wild, and the Horse was wild, and the Cow was wild, and the Sheep was wild, and the Pig was wild -as wild as wild could be - and they walked in the Wet Wild Woods by their wild lones. But the wildest of all the wild animals was the Cat. He walked by himself and all places were alike to him
I keep six honest serving men.
And when your back stops aching and your hands begin to harden, You will find yourself a partner in the Glory of the Garden.
Savings represent much more than mere money value. They are the proof that the saver is worth something in himself. Any fool can waste; any fool can muddle; but it takes something more of a man to save and the more he saves the more of a man he makes of himself. Waste and extravagance unsettle a man's mind for every crisis; thrift, which means some form of self-restraint, steadies it.
Similar quotes
If you view life as a gold rush, you're going to end up worshiping a golden calf. And when you call for help, and that golden calf can't respond, you go under.
In a way, women are a psychic immigrant group.
It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we're alive - to release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a facade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are.
We are constantly railing against the passions; we ascribe to them all of man's afflictions, and we forget that they are also the source of all his pleasures.
Christ will be master of the heart, and sin must be mortified. If your life is unholy, then your heart is unchanged, and you are an unsaved person. The Savior will sanctify His people, renew them, give them a hatred of sin, and a love of holiness. The grace that does not make a man better than others is a worthless counterfeit. Christ saves His people, not IN their sins, but FROM their sins. Without holiness, no man shall see the Lord.
A society is always eager to cover misdeeds with a cloak of forgetfulness, but no society can fully repress an ugly past when the ravages persist into the present. America owes a debt of justice which it has only begun to pay.